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Friday, July 30, 2010

Oh, and for some perspective about how far the Battleship came to peak of the Iowa class, here is a nice pic of her next to the uprighted USS OKLAHOMA (BB-37).As a final commentary - the USS OKLAHOMA (BB-37) was commissioned in 1916. The USS WISCONSIN (BB-64) in 1944. 28 years. Click that link above and come back.

20 comments:

LT B
said...

She's my fave! I've not been aboard the Missouri or New Jersey, but I've taken my boat outboard of her (NJ) in the Delaware River, and visited the Texas in Houston. Still, Ol' Whiskey is my fave. They may have finally opened her up. She was mothballed and thus locked up and preserved just in case. I doubt we'll see anything like the Iowa Class again. :(

If that isn't progress, I don't know what is. Not our fault that Clinton and Congress decided to scrap the program in favor of something smaller and not quite as capable. The ability to succeed exists here, if we fail to achieve it is only through lack of will.

If you are near the Gulf Coast, check out the USS Alabama. Not an Iowa Class, but still gorgeous and they have one of the turrets set up to go down into them. There is also a sub, and some planes there too. It is a nice little day you can spend touring history. They had one of the Army guys who survived the Bataan Death March there selling his book. Good stuff, and they let the Boy Scouts spend a weekend on it and do educational stuff there. Maybe to mirror the new Navy, they have baby changing stations onboard her.

Anon, if memory serves, it was the Navy that did not want the Seawolf. EB told Congress that if they didn't get the Virginia Class by such and such a date, that they would close down EB and all those highly experienced workers would be GONE. Thus, you have the Conneticut and the Carter...

We *are* in a period of rapid technological development... in the lab.

Combat-worthy laser cannons are... in the lab.Nanostructures capable of unheard-of strengths and weights are... in the lab.Polywell... in the lab.Heck, something as simple and basic as water desalinization/purification is looking at advances that could literally reshape politics and economics across the planet... in the lab.

All of these areas, and many more like them, have the potential to incur some fairly serious changes in military affairs directly or indirectly... if/when they ever get out of the lab.

So, yes, I sort-of agree with those folks. We're not seeing the changes yet--some, indeed, will be vaporware--but, if they do happen, expect some aftershocks.

She's a beautiful ship. Yes, we will never see the likes of them again. It's not because they're obsolete. It's because we've lost the capability to produce 18" thick rolled armor plate. Those mills are gone these days and unless we want to rebuild them, it ain't happening this century. Or ever.

There are quite a few 16" barrels and rounds still in storage, though. New barrels that were spares to be fitted later on. Up in Idaho if memory serves me correctly.

Yes, Tim, they are obsolete. We didn't lose any Iowa class battleships because we managed to castrate Imperial Japanese Navy aviation the first year of the war. Their training system wasn't designed to develop the number of aviators needed for a modern war.

Recall the US Navy took out the Yamato, Musashi, and and Shinano -three of the most heavily-armored ships in the world- with WW2-era torpedo & dive bombers. A single 5-kt Tomohawk (low end of a W80 variable-yield warhead) would fry a Yamato or an Iowa in a heartbeat.

The IOWAs really were beautiful ships. I am glad that they are all still around, at least for now. But, since we have basically lost our ability to operate oil fired steam plants, with all the people who know how either retired, or rapidly approaching retirement, I doubt if one will ever set sail again.

WISCONSIN once set a fuel economy record, using only one barrel of Navy Special Fuel Oil per mile. Not too shabby, when you consider that they were driving somthing over 100 feet wide through the water at 15 knots.

One of my goals over the next couple of years is to tour all the available battleships...as a naval history nerd I get all tingly just thinking about 'em. I hit the Mikasa about 2 months ago and loved it (and the 18" inch shell they have on display), can't wait to do the Texas, Missouri, Olympia (if she still floats by that time - and yes I know, not a BB, but still....), et al.

to be precise - Shinano was re-made int ocarrier by IJN themselves, and it was sunk by sub... other than that , pretty correct. carriers could sink any battleship from outside its gun range, which is why they replaced it as a naval "apex predator". Note that with present day missiles, both cruise and ballistic we can be into a new era where carrier from hunter can become the hunted...

LT B, I toured the Alabama last July 19, just after attending keel authentication ceremony of PCU America LHA 6, and I met that Army guy selling his book too. i received a signed copy, and spent the day on my boat reading it back here in Minnesota. Couldn't put it down.

The Alabama amazed me. I went down into the firing room - they had gyro's set to work with the waves, things had to match up before they could fire, and the firing key/trigger (officer) was a number of decks below the top deck. I had no idea that a battleship took that much 'smarts' to work, and the fact that the shipyard in 1940 could put together such a ship. I guess I'm saying I know the battleships was build then, I just didn't know how good the shipyards were at building them.

I had toured Missouri in Pearl in 2003, and they didn't give us the access that Alabama gave us. I went everywhere on Alabama, including the engine room, you could see how the shells were moved, all sizes, and I went in the 16" turrets, and there were seats in there! Someone was in there when the guns fired! That I don't get. But wow.

One thing that doesn't change though - I went to commissioining last year of CVN 77 and LHD 8, and the 'ladders' are the same size as on Alabama and Missouri.

Have to disagree. They might not be used in the role for which they were conceived, but they are not obsolete. The Iowas might have had a number of modernization initiatives that would have allowed them to continue to serve the fleet.

Your assertion about use of nukes is also not entirely correct. CROSSROADS tests found that armored warships were surprisingly survivable, and even the elderly Pennsylvania was hardly "fried" if properly washed down. Damaged, yes, with some serious loss of systems, but afloat and with main battery intact.

If you up the ante with the size of the warhead, your logic leads to navies themselves being obsolete (What are ya? In the Air Force or somethin'?) and that was proven hardly the case quite quickly. Ask Khruschev after October 1962.

You might see me make the rounds, too. Precisely my plan, as well. Except all steel ships if I can. Starting with BB59 in Fall River, and of course CA-139 in Quincy, and then up to USS Little Rock, etc.